


"Do your worst," I said. I didn't mean it.

by OccasionalAvenger



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-05
Updated: 2017-02-05
Packaged: 2018-09-22 03:21:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9580280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OccasionalAvenger/pseuds/OccasionalAvenger
Summary: Han Solo is dead, and there is a war, and the galaxy is without sentiment. For Leia Organa, two of these things have always been true.





	

            Leia could never begin to recover from the death of Alderaan. That was a given. She hadn’t met Obi Wan before his death, but Luke had told her once what the old Jedi had said at what must have been her home world’s final moment: “ _I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.”_

It took years to realize it, but Leia eventually came to understand that she had felt that same disturbance, the stabbing in her gut that was a genuine physical reaction, the Force’s presence within her shrieking at the sudden loss. In the few times that she ever ventured to describe the feeling, her diplomat’s eloquence always seemed to fail; there simply were no words. For it wasn’t millions as Obi Wan had said, but billions who had been silenced forever in the space of a second, Leia’s father among them.

            She watched them all perish.

            There was no recovering. There was simply life before Alderaan, and life after Alderaan. Leia understood this very well, and in time she came to accept the pain and even use it. Pain, she recognized, could easily be turned into fuel, and if it would help defeat the Empire, Leia was more than willing to be its vessel.

            And then Han died.

            Leia _felt_ it. A gaping, searing hole slashed through the very fabric of the Force. For an eternal moment, denial held her captive; her mind raced to think of reasons why this was false, why this couldn’t be happening.

            Han? _Her_ Han? No, never.

           

            But it was.

 

—

 

            She and the other soldiers waited next to the place where the _Falcon_ had been docked, watching the skies for the first sign of the returning heroes. Cheers rang across the runway; friends hugged and told jokes, everything ten times funnier in the wake of victory. Leia smiled and shook hands and thanked them all for their service. They were so joyful and young, and she was struck by a sudden, frantic desperation to save them, save them all before war stomped the light out of their eyes.

            Han would have wanted to die in place of these children, and the thought should have been comforting but it wasn’t.

            The first of the X-Wings streaked across the sky. The crowd whooped, and then roared when the _Falcon_ winked out of hyperspace. Leia’s stomach pricked with anticipation; for a moment she could have been thirty years younger, lingering on the edges of the hangar and watching that clunker of a ship pull in, praying she hadn’t sent him to his death.

            Only, this time she had. This time she was old and weary and Han wasn’t coming back.

            The girl came off the _Falcon_ last. Rey. Leia met her eyes, dull with anguish, and quickly understood two things: First, that Rey had loved Han. Second, she’d watched him die.

            They embraced, and the Force sang, and Rey wept.

 

—

           

_“Hey,” said Han, who apparently even in death would manage to irritate Leia via the dream world, “that was some nice apology you gave me.”_

_Leia gave him a glare that would have withered smarter men, who knew when to back down. Han, being very dumb, remained un-withered. “What in the name of the Force are you talking about?”_

_“Oh, y’mean that didn’t happen? I could have sworn it did…” He made a show of scratching his hair and stroking his chin. His eyes lit up. “Hey, you know, I must have hallucinated it while I was damn near_ freezing _to death and thinkin’ about your lovely final words to me. You’re a real charmer, Your Worship, y’know that? Why—”_

_“Oh, I’m sorry,” Leia hissed. “Forgive me if I wasn’t trying to charm your pants off when you had one foot out the door.”_

_“How ‘bout if I’d decided to stay, huh? Would you try and get in my pants then?”_

_“You’re impossible.” Leia shoved away from his hospital bed and leaned against one of snowy walls of the med-ward. She scowled. It was her own fault for ever thinking it was a good idea to come and check on him while Luke was in the bacta tank. Curse this Force forsaken ice planet for doing…whatever it was that was happening to her when it came to Han._

_“Hey, hey, Princess, I’m only joking.” There was a tremendous crash as Han scrambled out of bed and knocked most of the invaluable medical equipment surrounding him to the floor. Still clumsy and rosy-cheeked from the cold, he stumbled over so he was facing Leia and crossed his arms. “You, uh—well, thanks for comin’ to see me, I guess.”_

_Leia took him in—rumpled jacket, damp hair, trying to look sheepish and smug at the same time—and thought, in a moment of insanity, that she should maybe kiss him. She stepped closer, into his space, and tugged on the collar of his jacket, pulling it more snugly around him. “You’ll be staying, then?” she breathed._

_Han dipped his head, maybe careless, maybe an invitation, but Leia didn’t move either way. Just stared into his face and tried to look casual instead of pained. He smirked in a way that had little humor behind it. “Depends.”_

_“On?”_

_He slouched a little so that Leia could have closed the distance between with a mere tilt of her head. “Told ya already. Depends whether or not you—” His sentence cut off with a strangled gasp; he doubled over, and behind him Leia saw their son, Ben, tall and rangy and plunging a crackling red lightsaber into his father’s gut. He met Leia’s eyes. There was nothing of her son there, no mischief or petulance, just blazing hatred._

_Ben yanked his saber free with a snarl and Han crumpled to the floor. Leia fell to her knees beside him, but he was already gone, face blank and staring. “_ Han _,” she gasped, a sob tearing from her throat. She shook him, knowing it was useless, but begging anyway. “Please, Han, please.”_

           

Leia’s eyes flicked open. She sat up and found herself in her creaky bunk, one of dozens crammed into this damp chamber beneath the base. It had been a dream, a dream and a memory. But no less painful for either of those things, she thought, pressing a hand to one tear-stained cheek.

            She had thought about Hoth when he left for the last time. How watching him walk away had never been anything less than painful. Funny, when Han had left the _first_ time, she’d deemed him a lost cause, fully expecting to never see him again. She’d still loved him desperately, but she also knew him well enough to know that he was never coming back. But then he did, and if his death wasn’t proof that the universe cared not for happy endings, then nothing was.

 

—

 

            On clear nights, Leia sits in the cockpit of the _Falcon_ and watches the stars. She doesn’t blink, allowing the inky black sky to swell until it fills her vision and it’s almost like the ship is drifting through uninhabited space. Like maybe the hyper drive. Like at any moment Han will walk in, jawing at Chewie over his shoulder, and throw himself into the pilot’s seat. _How’s the weather look out there, Princess?_

She blinks, and he’s gone.

Han Solo is dead, and there is a war, and the galaxy is without sentiment. For Leia Organa, two of these things have always been true. It is much harder, she thinks, rolling her shoulders to better bear the weight of all her years, to live for a cause than to die for one. She never did anything the easy way, Han used to say that, so perhaps it makes sense that she’s here and he’s not. She’s not convinced that she deserves to be the dumping ground for all the galaxy’s pain, but someone has to bear it. It might as well be her.

**Author's Note:**

> Y'ALL. I actually posted something I said I was gonna post. Comments are the best thing to ever happen to me.


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